From The Dots
In mid-April, Dorothy surprised Dot by taking her to a resort. It was in the middle of the desert and Dorothy loved it because she could hear coyotes howling all night.
She got a suite for them to share. It had a large balcony that overlooked the warren-like courtyard of grassy nooks, flowering planters, and sleek wooden benches. A woman sunned herself on a towel in the nude.
Dorothy turned to Dot, grinning. “There’s a marvelous story about a murder at this hotel. Celebrities used to come here in the sixties, especially those who slept their way to the top. This one girl, she must have been mixed in with the wrong crowd, because someone killed her in that courtyard. Hit her over the head. And the next day, when the staff found her, they identified her as a different starlet—a more famous one. They planned this elaborate funeral for her. Friends and family from out of state came in droves. The FBI was doing a full-scale investigation. But then the starlet emerged, alive and well. Turns out, being dead for three days did wonders for her career. She made quite a few movies after that! Married a good friend of Sinatra’s!”
“But what about the real murdered girl?” Dot gasped.
Dorothy shrugged. “Oh, I have no idea what happened to her. She probably got in over her head with some goons, and that’s why they killed her.”
“They never figured out who did it?”
“No, I don’t believe so. This other girl wasn’t much of a priority.”
“Did the star who lived pay some sort of homage to her?” Dot asked. “I mean, it was because of this poor dead girl that her career took off, right? I hope she was grateful.”
A thoughtful look crossed Dorothy’s features, and then she looked at Dot squarely. “You know what would be interesting? If the famous starlet was actually the one in trouble with the goons in Palm Springs, but she sent this other gal in her place to bear their wrath. She got out of a jam and a career boost, lucky thing.”
“Huh?”
“Oh, don’t listen to me.” She playfully slapped Dot’s arm. “I’m just making up a plot.”
When they went to the bar, Dorothy wore her sunglasses and scarf. “Why don’t you want anyone to notice you?” Dot asked as her aunt checked herself out in the mirror.
Dorothy’s mouth made a straight line. “I just don’t want to answer questions.”
“Questions about what?”
“I wear many hats, Dot. I have my hands in many pies.”
Someone started playing a piano, an old-timey twenties tune with lots of trills and flourishes.
“Why does my mother hate you?” Dot blurted.
Dorothy grew still. “Is that what she said? That she hates me?”
Dot didn’t answer.
Dorothy’s head drooped. She made a clucking sound with her tongue. “We used to be good friends, marvelous friends, especially growing up. I mean, we didn’t see each other much, but there was still a bond, you know? I was always the pretty one, but I was unlucky in love. Your mother’s husband, your father? He was a peach. A good man. Took care of her and you. He lived in Los Angeles, which is why you all moved there. I moved to follow you. I bet you didn’t know that.”
Dot shook her head. She did not.
“But your mother is . . . Well, you know her. She didn’t give your father what he needed. I was over a lot—I could tell what was happening to their marriage. I saw him looking at me, too. I tried to ignore it, but I had needs, too. I’d just gotten divorced. I’d just lost Thomas. I was single and rich and miserable. I only kissed him once, but your mother caught us. She banished me from then on. Said I was no longer her sister.”
“You kissed my father?”
“No, darling, he kissed me. But he wasn’t a bad man. Please don’t think that. It just . . . happened. Sometimes things do. But anyway, your mother read it how she wanted to read it. I was the instigator, she thought. We didn’t speak for a time. I think she understood what I meant to you and what you meant to me. She also knew how I could help out, financially. So she agreed that you and I could still visit. But she made it clear she wasn’t happy with me.
“I did everything in my power to win your mother back. After your father passed away, your mother found out he had bad debts and no life insurance policy. She really did work like a dog to keep you two afloat. I said I’d help out, but she wouldn’t accept my money.” Dorothy paused to sip. “Your mother is very proud.”
Dot widened her eyes. So Dorothy had offered to help out. She curled her fist under the table.
“From then, things started to fall apart between us again,” Dorothy explained. “She enjoyed working, and she made excuses to work, but I think she sensed it wasn’t right. The guilt weighed on her. She took it out on me. She was jealous of our relationship. Yours and mine. I could do for you what she couldn’t.”
“Did she send you away?” Dot cried.
Dorothy stared at the table. Slowly, she licked her lips. “I don’t want to drive a wedge between you, dear,” she said softly.
Dot snorted. The wedge was already there. “Mom says you’re unwell.”
A muscle in Dorothy’s cheek twitched. She took Dot’s hands and looked at her hard. Her eyes were so clear and violet. “What do you think? Do you think I’m unwell?”
“No,” Dot answered. But then she thought of what her boyfriend had said. That Dorothy was a bully. How much do you know about her? Why was he so mistrusting?
A group of boys about Dot’s age passed through the bar just then. Dot watched them carefully—they were bearded, dirty, their jeans cut skinny, their shoes carefully weathered. They were probably coming from the three-day concert that was taking place the next town over. It was the kind of concert where you camped out and took a lot of drugs; Dot and Marlon had thought about going but then had decided not to because neither of them had anything appropriate to wear.
The boys slunk up to guests in the bar and whispered in their ears. They were targeting other young people, it seemed, and each person they asked frowned, digested their question, then shook their heads. Finally, the boys made their way to Dot, but when they noticed that Dorothy was older, they started to move on.
“Wait!” Dorothy cried. The boys turned. “You guys either have something or are looking for something. Which is it?”
Dot nudged her. “What are you doing?”
Dorothy’s gaze was still on the group. “I’m not a cop, fellas. I’m honestly curious.”
The boys shifted their weight, stuck their hands in their pockets. They all exchanged a glance, then shrugged. “We have a bunch of flakka,” the shortest and dirtiest one, his dreadlocks literally caked with mud, said. “We’re looking for takers.”
“What’s flakka?”
“Not for you,” the tallest one said quickly.
“How do you know?” Dorothy asked. Dot stared at her in horror.
The boy in the middle, who was the most normal looking, his brown hair only a little shaggy and his face clean-shaven, shrugged. “It’s kinda like ecstasy, and it’s kinda like a roofie, except not as dangerous.” His friends nudged him and gave him sharp looks. “What?” he murmured to them. “She asked.”
“It’s not like she knows what a roofie is, dude,” Dirty Dreadlocks spat.
Dorothy scoffed. “I know what a roofie is, boys. And sure. We’ll take some.”
“No we won’t!” Dot cried.
Dorothy was already getting out some cash. Dot looked around frantically, paranoid someone in the bar was going to be wise to their drug deal. The police would come, Dorothy would go to jail, and Dot would somehow be implicated, and then her mother would find out.
It was over quickly, though, the exchange fluid and discreet. The boys slunk away. The biggest one’s dreadlocks bounced cheerfully. They all had slow, dumb laughs; Dot wondered if they were already high.
She turned to Dorothy. “What are you trying to prove?”
“Nothing,” Dorothy said haughtily. “Oh, well, maybe a little. I was teaching them not to be so ageist. Sometimes women in their early fifties like to party, too.”
Dot stared at the pocket where Dorothy had slipped the pills. “It’s not like you’re going to take those, are you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” She drained the last of her stinger. “Don’t worry, dear, it’ll be someday when you’re not around. A random afternoon when I’m feeling lonely.”
“Then I’ll have to stick by you every day,” Dot said. “Make sure you don’t ever take it. It might kill you.”
Dorothy’s face brightened. “Darling. That would be absolutely lovely if you stuck by my side every single day.”
Back at home, Dot told Marlon the story. She told it in a joking way—my crazy aunt! Isn’t she a card? She told him after they’d had sex, when he was in a good mood. But Marlon paled.
“Shit,” he said in a far-off voice. “I’d never even thought of that.”
“What?” Dot asked, sitting up. “What are you talking about?”
“Roofies. Maybe she’s drugging you.”
Dot barked out an angry laugh. “I can’t believe you’d say such a thing!”
“I keep working it out in my head, Dot. That night when we went out with her? You really hadn’t had much. There had to be something else in the mix. Something that made you pass out like that.”
“My aunt loves me!” Dot cried. “She wouldn’t roofie me! Take it back!”
He threw up his hands. “I didn’t want to tell you this, but I looked up some facts about that Otufu story. Where your aunt visited is fairly stable. There are no warlords.”
“So what? She got her story mixed up.”
“Or maybe she was making all of it up. I talked to my grandparents, too. They said she was a real nut. Used to walk around the Magnolia grounds naked. Don’t ever swim in her bungalow’s pool. She used to have orgies in there.” He made a face.
Dot got up from the bed and pulled on her sweatshirt. “You were asking around about her? What gives you the right?”
“I was just asking some questions. I want to protect you.”
Dot glared at him. “Even if all of this is true, does that make her a bad person? A person who’d roofie someone?”
“I don’t know. Maybe?”
“I can’t believe you’re saying this.” She stepped into her underwear and jeans, grabbed her backpack, and headed toward the door. “Call me when you grow up.”
“Come on. Don’t be like that. Don’t kill the messenger.”
Dot stared into the grungy dorm hallway. “I think we should break up.”
“Dot! I love you. I’m not saying this to hurt you.”
Dot shut her eyes. She knew he did. But why couldn’t he love Dorothy? Why was he trying to undermine her?
“Please don’t go out with her anymore,” Marlon said. “Just for a little while. Just until we can figure out what’s true and what’s not.”
Dot stared at the door that led to the hall. There was a thin beam of fluorescent light poking through the peephole. “I can’t do that.”
Behind her, he sighed. His hands moved away from her; she could feel his heat recede. She flung open the door and ran, a ball lodged in her throat. She ran down the hall and entered the little nook that held the dorm’s vending machines, wedged herself between the Pepsi machine and the ice maker, and rested her head between her knees for a long, long time.